Genre:

Essay

Subjects:

Railways, Travel, Amusement, Class, Mesmerism

    Observes that 'Dispensing and receiving hospitality in the country to the extent to which it is now carried may be classed among the institutions which have grown out of railway travelling. Distance is, now-a-days, the one thing never dreamt of as an excuse either for not inviting or for declining' (710), and exclaims, 'Railways! I thank you!' (711). Describes the frustration of modern young men at 'being kept long in the dining-room after the fair objects of their aspirations have left', depicting 'Fitz-Romeo [...] trying to mesmerise by his vacant stare the topmost plum of the pyramid before him' (712).